What are your Top 5/Bottom 5 States?

[superphoenix]

Hey all,
I know a lot of us are pretty well traveled here and I'm curious to get a ranking of everyone's top 5/bottom 5 states, and hopefully some reasons for why those states made your ranking there.

My top 5 (in no particular order):
California - What can I say? From mountains to beaches to literally any and every kind of beautiful landscape, this state has it all, and pretty progressive politics for the US. Generally chill people.

Pennsylvania - Philly's where I'd be if I wasn't in New York, beautiful forests, Pittsburgh seems like a cool place as well

Hawaii - A bit pricey to live in but beautiful landscape all around (it's more than just Honolulu!)

Colorado - Once again, no end to the beautiful mountain landscape, and lots of outdoorsy activities for someone like me who enjoys that kind of thing

New York- I'm super biased, but Brooklyn will always be cool, and the Catskills and Adirondacks have some of the best scenery on the east coast. Decently liberal politics in the city as well.

I've heard great things about Montana, Alaska, and Tennessee as well

I don't want to rank Bottom 5 because I've only been to 22 states so far and I think there are more good states than bad ones.

But for those of you more well-traveled than I , what are your top/bottom 5 and why?

 

[roughdraft]

well its very futile to generalize, this is riddled with bias and as much experience as inexperience in every case - but my little corner of life says

Oregon - lots of different microclimates to put it lightly, some decent urban, some moderately rural, some remote, ocean, wet, dry, so much public land, good coffee and food, no sales tax games, sure there are tweakers but i met quite a lot of people who within their individual are great for conversation and great too for minding their own business, which is the ideal balance isn't it? happy canadian and european traveling folk i found here more than in other corners too. Anyway, it was the first state i knew west of the Mississippi and i fell in love

Washington State - see above, second state i knew well out there.

those are actually the only ones i like

Colorado is fine too.

Maryland is home, too much pollution and private land.

number 5....think ill go with New York for the awesome mountains and some public land, plus the city, with the international population

i also go with your desires to know Montana and especially Alaska. Tennesse I did not like.

 

[Deleted member 23824]

I cannot limit states I don’t like to only 5. In general, I prefer avoiding anything south of the Mason-Dixon line, with exceptions. The reasons are varied, from the heat and humidity, food, hillbillys, thinking and attitudes that are generally about 40 years behind the rest of the nation, etc. And doublewide trailers!

The exceptions are the mountainous sections within the South, those are beautiful in any part of the country. I also do not care for the crowded Eastern seaboard states : as Stobe often said there is absolutely no reason to ever go there.

Next year I want to hit up the beautiful northeastern states that I’ve not been to, in the fall, among other places. Gonna do a grand hitchhiking tour of the four corners of the US, hopefully. Except Florida, for fuck sake, no reason to go there either, so NO will have to do for my S E corner.

 

[Older Than Dirt]

I have only been to 31 states so far, which means i have no idea compared to most here, especially much west of the Mississippi, but;

Best (no order; 3 of 5 have legal weed, and NY will next year)

• Vermont
• Massachusetts (except the hellhole known as Boston, but this probably just sheer NYC bigotry derived from sports and hardcore. And i mean like Lowell, and Worcester, and whatnot, but this goes without saying.)
• Colorado (other than the fact that there is no air in their air, at least for the first couple days)
• NY (NYC [center of the universe, of course], Catskills, Hudson Valley highlands, Adirondacks.)
• Pennsylvania

Worst (also no order, of course no legal weed in any of these shithole states)

• The whole south below the Mason-Dixon line except Nola, especially including Florida, a shithole. Full of weird racist rednecks who think putting mayonnaise on a grilled cheese sandwich is somehow normal or acceptable. See the documentary Deliverance for all you need to know about the south.
• New Jersey (probably the single worst state in the US. Hitchhiking is very illegal, and they are the worst drivers in the US, and i say this as someone who has spent a lot of time in Mass. NJ residents literally cannot make a left turn ("jughandles" mean you only ever turn right). Just an awful place except the shore which is good, but that's all people from NYC and Philly. The Pine Barrens are also cool, but devoid of water, and also of NJ residents (this is one of the main reasons the Barrens are good). Even when they legalize weed soon, avoid. The Florida of the north.)
• New Hampshire (the evil twin of Vermont, just as many junkies as Vt, plus tweakers which Vt doesn't have [Vt has a helmet law, which means no biker "clubs"= no meth (there was this Hells Angel who tried to live in Bennington (VT) for a while, but he moved away after the second time his house burned down- must have been a sensitive type)]. Junk cars and garbage everywhere, amidst all the beautiful nature they are busy trashing. Very right-wing; they do not like non-white folks, hippies, punks, or anyone who is not from NH. The only bad place in New England (other than Connecticut on i-95 (evil state troopers))
• Kansas (have only been though here on a bus but just seems pointless really. No one would mind if it was removed.)
• Indiana (why?)